


Dance

by Nununununu



Category: Gideon the Ninth - Tamsyn Muir, The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: A different end to the pool scene, Don't copy to another site, F/F, First Kiss, In a specific sense, Kissing, Play Fighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:47:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21582538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nununununu/pseuds/Nununununu
Summary: Gideon gets to have some fun doing what she does best.
Relationships: Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Comments: 13
Kudos: 162
Collections: 300bpm Flash Exchange November 2019





	Dance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [adspexi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/adspexi/gifts).



> Fic continues directly from the lines quoted at the beginning. Written with this song as a prompt [Spooky Scary Skeleton Dance Remix](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_qbGJuxCYY).

_“Do you really have the hots for some chilly weirdo in a coffin?”_

_One of the skeletons punted her back into the water._

(Gideon The Ninth chapter 31, p.357)

Gideon shot back out of the pool in a great tidal wave of water, bounded onto the smooth ground and only nearly slipped and broke her neck a little, regained her footing and punched the skeleton in the face. Its head parted ways with its body beautifully, flying off to smash on the ground no few feet away, a dozen little pieces of cranium spinning and skittering to a stop while the rest of the skeleton staggered, flailed and fell in the water with a pathetic splash.

The whole thing was eminently satisfying, but particularly the look on Harrow’s face.

“Do you _always_ have to break stuff?” she complained.

The skeletons rowed around the room did nothing, remaining silent, still perfect. Sizing them up, Gideon took a moment to shoot the Reverend Daughter a grin.

Did Harrow even need to _ask_?

If she’d been holding her rapier, Gideon probably would have twirled it. She raised an enthusiastic fist regardless of the fact the chilly embrace of her wet shirt was disgusting, her whole self dripping wet, “Fuck yeah!”

For a nonsensical second of complete stupidity, she was convinced her necromancer smiled. A tiny smile, sure, but a sweet one – and Harrowhark signally _did not do sweet_.

A fresh skeleton, seemingly birthed from nowhere, appeared in a stealth attack behind Gideon to smack her in the head. Gideon whirled, ducked low, spun in a half circle as she rose with rapier now in hand, and tried hitting it like she was holding her broadsword. When this didn’t work, she kicked it in the legs, shoved it into the pool, and, when it promptly surfaced, dodged its grabby hands to yank off its skull.

“Catch!” She threw this at its creator.

“ _Griddle!_ ” Harrowhark, with her limp noodle arms, very nearly failed to prevent the thing from getting her in the face. Her expression went murderous, but also possibly, just possibly, a very, very miniscule amount of some other previously unknown emotion in addition to this –

And that emotion was _amused_.

Gideon was clearly hallucinating.

Two more skeletons rose into being besides her out of the smallest bits of bone dust scattered on the ground, simultaneously snatching for her sword and sword hand, and that was it –

It was _on_.

Gideon Nav hadn’t had this much fun in a long time.

Scratch that, she hadn’t had this much fun _ever_. Like literally ever – no one in the Ninth House had even _heard_ of fun, of course, although if they had they would have done everything they could to crush and suck all the life out of it. But Harrow – still in the pool, her hands barely outspread and only the slightest trickle of blood licking around her nostrils to indicate any effort – threw skeleton after skeleton at Gideon, as her cavalier slid and slipped and skidded in the puddles on the floor, and while this scenario was in many ways entirely and tiresomely familiar, it was simultaneously completely entirely unfamiliar and energising in a way Gideon completely didn’t expect.

“Take that, bitches!” Hollering joyfully, she punched, kicked, hit, stabbed, slashed and shoved her way through countless of the things, tossing as many of them into the pool to meet their mistress as possible – which was a lot – highly amused by the way Harrow ended up pretty much wading through the things, the other girl’s concentration on the fight and not how crowded her location was getting.

It was almost like a dance, actually – not the grinding dirges and howling laments that echoed through Drearburh on the regular, but set to some beat Gideon had never heard before, but that had her heart pounding and her feet thumping, and a grin stretching her face fit to burst.

“You look like an idiot,” Ever one for compliments, Harrow observed.

“Suck it, Nonagesimus,” Her grin undiminishing, Gideon simply _demolished_ a skeleton as she whirled to face her necromancer, finding Harrow had got her act together enough in order to get the skeletons filling the swimming pool to hoist her aloft and pass her from bony hand to hand out of the water in a way that _absolutely wasn’t at all cool_ , depositing Harrow neatly on the pool edge so that Gideon’s whirlwind movement brought them abruptly far too close together.

Her breath caught so hard she practically snorted. Harrow was panting a little in contrast, which was rich seeing as she’d gone to no physical effort unless, in her feeble three-muscled state, being carted out of a pool counted.

Those pitch-black-on-stark-white eyes of hers were _lambent_. Their faces were so close it would take no effort for Gideon to head-butt the Reverend Daughter at all.

“Harrow?” Fuck, Gideon’s voice sounded wrecked, in a way that wasn’t to do with the fight whatsoever. She was peripherally aware that she had vanquished the last of the new attack-skeletons, the original creepy chaperone ones still locked in their positions around the room, and the ones that had helped Harrow out of the water were all crumbling.

For all intents and purposes, they were alone in the room. They _were_ alone in the room and had been all along – that was the whole fucking point of it – but Gideon felt sharply _aware_ of this in a way she hadn’t previously been.

The unexpected spider-creep touch of Harrow’s thin stabby fingers against her knuckles near enough made Gideon shriek.

“Fuck, Harrow, go and give me a heart attack why don’t you,” she started, but it was weak – Gideon could hear how weak the protest sounded, and for some bizarre insane reason she wasn’t pulling away.

Why wasn’t she pulling away?

They had held hands in the water and Harrow had struggled like a rat in a trap when Gideon had hugged her, but this felt different – it felt _different_ – it –

Harrow was speaking, while Gideon was indeed suffering a minor palpitation. Maybe not that minor, if she was honest.

And what Harrow was saying, leaning in close much like Gideon had earlier leaned in close, piercingly intent, was this:

“Griddle, you no-brained moron, _I do not_ _have_ _the_ _hots for some chilly weirdo in a coffin.”_

“Oh,” This was, it had to be said, one of the worst of Gideon’s comebacks, but she reckoned she could be forgiven, because Harrow was leaning up and in even further – or maybe it was Gideon who was leaning down and in, because Harrowhark was still a truncated goblin of a person – and then – and then, quite hideously and completely something she would forever repent and regret –

Their mouths met.

Harrow tasted overwhelmingly of ash and saline. Gideon kissed her anyway, kissed her hard until the other girl was gasping and a fresh taste sprang up between them – blood, it was blood, why did it have to be blood; Gideon was _so fucking unsurprised_ by this. Then someone made a noise that was really quite mortifying and their teeth clicked together, and Gideon discovered she was grasping at Harrow’s soggy black clothes and Harrow was doing the same.

They parted in a sudden hurry when Gideon pressed forwards that bit too enthusiastically and Harrow, her heels catching on the edge, nearly took an unplanned tumble back into the pool – and then they were simply clutching at each other a bit, holding each other and laughing – _laughing!_

It was madness.

Gideon fully expected her necromancer to start spontaneously combusting. Or perhaps she suddenly would. She certainly felt – _hotter_ than usual, despite her general drenched and salt-encrusted state from the pool.

Given that they had probably triggered the apocalypse, Gideon could see no other recourse than to pull Harrow in and do her utmost to ravish her mouth again.

It wasn’t quite as skilful an attempt as Gideon had always previously managed in her imagination or quite as filthy as the kisses depicted in her magazines, but Harrow still made a muffled squawk and ended up sagging somewhat at the knees, swaying into her, and so Gideon totally counted it as a massive win.

“Your face is stupid,” she informed Harrow joyfully, when they eventually pulled back.

“ _Your_ face is stupider,” was Harrow’s notably uninventive retort, which just went to show that kissing wasn’t good for anyone’s intelligence, but Gideon’s strength had always been in her muscles anyway and not her brain, and so she felt no compunction whatsoever to stop.

They had to leave this place eventually and probably talk some more about all the shit that had gone on, like the shuttle and what had happened to Ortus and his mother, and that weird ass duo from the Eighth –

But for now Harrow’s twig-like arms were winding around Gideon’s shoulders, tugging her back demandingly in for another kiss, and Gideon – for once in her existence – was entirely happy to obey.


End file.
